I have used Dragon from day one, version 1. I stopped at 8

(professional), as it was working satisfactorily for quite a few

years. I mainly use it to dictate my daily medical patient notes,

plus I use a few short cuts and macros. Lately after a PC crash,

I just can't seem to get back to satisfactory, even after backing

up from previously reliable files. So I'm looking to go to version

10. I don't think I need the professional version, preferred might

be fine. Does the Dragon 10 upgrade use all my old words? Or

should I dump it all and just go 10 preferred?
Thanks for any input.

If speech recognition plays an important role in your workflow, using out of date software not only costs you time but additionally costs you money from the lack of features and accuracy. Our NaturallySpeaking 10 Review compares DNS 9 to DNS 10 but you can basically double the effect when comparing it to Ver. 8.

Martin brought up a good point about EMR software. If you're using one of the following EMRs you will need the Pro to Medical 10.1 Upgrade because you can't turn on the NaturallySpeaking microphone in any other version of NaturallySpeaking when dictating into one of the previously mentioned EMR applications.

If you're not using an EMR application, we would recommend upgrading to the NaturallySpeaking Pro 10.1 Upgrade but unfortunately you just missed the end of the year sale where you could have purchased the Pro upgrade for the same price as Preferred 10.1. Although, as Marty mentioned, DNS Preferred will work, we cannot recommend it for professional use and you would lose a lot of important features that are only available in the professional versions of NaturallySpeaking such as Roaming user profile (being able to use the same user on multiple computers), the ability to create powerful macros, deferred corrections (the ability to link a recording of your voice to a file), multiple vocabularies, a new type of bookmark technology that allows you to jump from field to field, industrial-strength Vocabulary Builder.... The NaturallySpeaking Comparison Matrix includes a more complete list.

We additionally recommend purchasing peripherals (microphones, sound cards, digital recorders, command software etc.) from a Nuance certified/licensed speech recognition specialist for an extra layer of NaturallySpeaking technical support because it's all tied together.

Thanks for the quick reply.
I'm able to pull up my Dragon 8 Pro, and it dictates right into a trial copy of 'Amazing Charts', an EMR we're demoing now.
Maybe the Medical edition might integrate better into some. or other EMR's?

*****Why are there duplicate posts and replies?

It sounds like there may be some confusion with our previous answer. If you're planning on using NaturallySpeaking 10 with one of the more popular EMR applications, which includes Amazing Charts, your only option will be to upgrade to the Pro to Medical 10.1 Upgrade. Although NaturallySpeaking Preferred and Pro 8/9 will work in Amazing Charts, Preferred and Pro 10 simply will not because NaturallySpeaking includes the ability to detect the application and the name of the Window you are attempting to dictate into. Nuance prevents NaturallySpeaking Standard, Preferred, Professional and Legal from working in most EMR programs, such as Amazing Charts. If you attempt to use Pro 10 or Preferred 10 in Amazing Charts, the microphone will simply turn off. If you're planning on upgrading to NaturallySpeaking Ver. 10, be aware that only the medical versions will work in Amazing Charts.

Duplicate posts are usually caused by accidentally double-clicking the Reply button but can sometimes be caused by a forum hickup. This is a fairly common problem with most, if not all, forums but forums like SpeechComputing.com and the KnowBrainer Speech Recognition Forums are carefully watched by the forum moderator and the KnowBrainer Speech Recognition Forum have 5 moderators which automatically delete duplicate postings and spam. This forum is only occasionally moderated and usually only when a complaint is lodged because it only receives a fraction of the traffic of the other 2 forums. For example, this forum only received one question with 2 other members responding in the last 24 hours while the KnowBrainer Speech Recognition Forum's received 41 posts.